Hawaii’s Mountains – Here’s a link to the live web cam on the summit of near 13,800 foot Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii. This web cam is available during the daylight hours here in the islands…and when there’s a big moon shining down during the night at times. Plus, during the nights you will be able to see stars, and the sunrise and sunset too… depending upon weather conditions.

Aloha Paragraphs

Pristine beach on the Big Island of Hawaii

Generally good weather, with just a few
showers here and there…most frequent
over and near Kauai

Winds quite light for the next several days…from the southeast generally. Here’s the latestweather map, showing the Hawaiian Islands, and the rest of the North Pacific Ocean. Here’s a real-time wind profile of the central Pacific…centered on the Hawaiian Islands. ~~~ We find low pressure systems to the north-northeast and northeast of the islands…with a trailing cold front just to the north and northwest of Kauai. At the same time, we see a high pressure system well offshore to the northeast of Hawaii…with a ridge extending west to near the islands. We’ll find a period of southeast winds through mid-week, as this weak cold front moves by, or stalls just to the north of the state. A trade wind flow will begin again late Thursday or early Friday into Saturday. A new approaching low pressure system will arrive Sunday into early next week, bringing back lighter southeast breezes…along with more vog then too.Satellite imageryshows patchy low clouds over and around the state, along with generally clear skies over the central islands…except over and around the mountains. We can see the fragmented outline of this cold front to the northwest and north of Kauai. Here’s thelooping radar image, showing just a few light showers coming into the state, most concentrated around Kauai. Looking at this largersatellite image, which is in the looping mode, we can see an area of deeper clouds to our northeast pulling away from the state to the northeast. At the same time, we can see another area of low pressure well to our west, with developing thunderstorm activity. Finally, well to the south and southwest, we see an area of thunderstorms, where the northern and southern hemisphere trade wind flow collides…called the Inter-tropical convergence zone (ITCZ).

This cold front just to our north and northwest…should remain more or less in place into mid-week. We’re expecting fairly dry weather conditions to prevail, although with a few showers locally, especially over the slopes during the afternoon hours…although not even many of them for the time being. Later this week by around Thursday evening or so, this front, which will be to the north and northeast of the state, will contribute its remnant clouds and showers to our windward sides on Kauai and perhaps Oahu…on the strengthening trade winds into Saturday. The rest of the state will get into this windward shower activity Friday and Saturday as well, although the leeward sides should be drier and more sunny.

The latest model output suggests that the trade winds will falter again Sunday into early next week, with returning southeasterly breezes carrying volcanic haze over the smaller islands again then. Those same models are now suggesting that we’ll have a Kona low pressure system forming to the west of the state early next week as well. It should be pointed out that anytime we have that type of low pressure system located to the west of us, there’s always that possibility of very wet weather, although that’s yet to be determined at this point…stay tuned. I’ll be back early Wednesday morning with your next new weather narrative, I hope you have a great Tuesday night wherever you’re spending it! Aloha for now…Glenn.

Here on Maui, at the 3,100 foot elevation, at my upper Kula, Maui weather tower, the air temperature was 52.9F degrees at 550amon this early Tuesday morning. It’s still too dark to see out, so when it gets light, I’ll let you know what I see in our local skies. I expect to see rather thick volcanic haze (vog) this morning, as there was sure lots of it around at sunset yesterday evening! I don’t hear my wind chimes going off, so it’s calm out at the moment.

~~~ It’s now 715am, and definitely light enough to see out and about. The skies are free of clouds, with no clouds in sight at the time of this writing. As I had suspected, there is still volcanic haze around, maybe not quite as thick as last evening, although definitely still moderately heavy. The air temperature is still a cool 53.4 degrees. If it weren’t for this haze, it would be a very nice day, and actually…its still a nice day anyway. For me personally, the vog will limit my outdoor activities, including my morning fast walk.

~~~ We’ve pushed into the early evening hours here on Maui, and with it, mostly cloudy conditions. The volcanic haze, better known as vog here in the state, is pretty much thick as a brick. There aren’t strong enough winds around, to ventilate this stuff away. These generally light breezes are coming out of the southeast, blowing straight across the volcanic vents on the Big Island…and carrying those emissions right over the smaller islands to the northwest. It’s not a pretty picture by any means, and looks more like Los Angeles, or someplace else, with heavy smog sitting over it! The air temperature at 140pm was 70.2 degrees, while down at the ocean, at Kahului at the same time, it was a warmer 82 degrees.

~~~ It’s cloudy here in Kula at 6pm, with fog just up the mountain from here, and muted sun in the westerly direction…signaling the sunset hour. I caught sight of the sun just before it sunk into the ocean to our west, and it turned out to be a dull red ball, made that color by the haze in the air now. This nasty volcanic haze is still around, and evident in our local atmosphere. I expect this vog to be around again Wednesday, and perhaps right on into Thursday. The returning trade winds Friday will help to ventilate it away…briefly. It was a decent day, despite the stagnant air mass that remains over the state. The clouds overhead at the time of this writing, should evaporate a bit later this evening, making way for a clear to partly cloudy and cool start to the day Wednesday. By the way, thanks to all you folks who are clicking on the Google Ads…its partially what keeps this website going! The ads are at the top and bottom of each page.

Interesting:Climate Change and Human Health – Sea level rises, changes to the severity of monsoon seasons and rainfall, flooding, droughts and heat waves are all having an increasing impact on human health, writes Geordon Shannon.

The loss of healthy life years in low-income African countries is predicted to be 500 times that in Europe.

It is beyond doubt that our emissions of greenhouse gases contribute to climate change. And climate change is making us sick.

The World Health Organization estimates that between 1970 and 2004, the environmental effects of climate change caused more than 140,000 deaths each year.

And the direct financial cost of the damage it will have on our health is estimated to come in at around US $2-4 billion in just over 15 years time.

Extreme weather events

We tend to think of large-scale weather events as ‘natural’ disasters, but the case is increasingly being made for a man-made cause and effect for some of these.

While it is difficult to attribute single events such as Hurricane Katrina to climate change, climatologists have suggested a possible role in contributing to the intensity of these kinds of events. And flooding, droughts, heat waves, and the spread of disease have all been linked to climate change.

In the UK, adverse weather events already have a palpable public presence. Only last year, a prolonged heat wave claimed around 650 excess deaths in England.

Heat wave risk ‘doubled’

And according to the authors of a report on the disastrous 2003 heat wave that claimed 20,000 lives across Europe, it is “very likely” that human influence has at least doubled the risk of another particularly bad one happening again.

Julia Slingo, the Met Office’s chief scientist, said that the evidence suggests climate change is likely to be a factor, in the severe weather that has caused torrential rain and flooding in the south of England over the past two months.

Since December there have been 130 severe flood warnings (compared to nine in 2012) which not only poses an immediate physical risk to people, but also threatens to undermine the country’s food security.

And such climatic events are occurring with increasing severity and frequency across the globe.

Glenn,
We’ve been here in Haiku for only a few months, but have found and love checking your weather narrative each day.
I’m 66 years old but enjoy hiking around the Island a bit. I’m thinking of hiking from the summit down the Sky-line trail to the Waipoli Rd. somewhere (maybe to the start of the blacktop or to where the Mamane trail/Waiohuli trail crosses Waipoli Rd.) I have done the Mamane/Waiohuli section, but didn’t get to look around much because of the fog.
I would like to know if you know of some typical pre-weather conditions that exist a day or two ahead, that sort of have a Waipoli fog-free day to typically follow?
Waiting to hear from you–Bob Moore~~~Hi Bob, good to hear from you. Good question, and the simple answer, and it may be too simple however…go as early in the morning as you can. The mid to late mornings, through the afternoon hours, are typically cloudy/foggy along that exposure of the Haleakala slope. It’s such a regular thing in that area. If the trade winds are blowing, they often have clouds forming around 10am on those slopes. If the Kona winds are blowing, it can be anytime that the moisture is pushed upslope, cooling, with clouds forming. When light winds are present, light and variable with sea breezes, the convective cumulus clouds get forming in the later morning hours as well…or before. It’s a tough area to find really nice clear weather for good viewing opportunities, at least in a forecast sense. I’m not sure I helped you very much however! Aloha, Glenn / PS thanks for using my website for your weather needs, and welcome to Maui!